Early last year, my family and I drove a total of 20 hours to move from San Diego to an island in Puget Sound. Though we had planned this move for years and anticipated the changes, the reality of it was different than we expected.
We arrived in the final weeks of Winter. Despite having more than enough blankets, we shivered at night and ordered thicker coats a few days later.
Soon, Spring came and the broad fields near the house exploded with yellow and white dandelions. Blue and purple wild flowers blossomed along the street. We ordered our first cloth masks and wiped down all our groceries and mail.
In Summer, the warm days stretched out. The dense wooded areas nearby became denser and greener. Ocean breeze filled the house. We dug our hiking boots out of our moving boxes and started hesitantly leaving the house more. We found, bought, and moved-into our brand new home.
In Fall, after everything was unpacked and settled, the maples and birches molted into bright reds, oranges, and yellows. It was gorgeous. We went apple picking and we laughed as our son toddled around a pumpkin patch, slapping the pumpkins and giggling to himself.
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In 2016, the first World Happiness Report from the United Nations was published — Denmark was ranked #1 (they would be first or second the following four years as well). A lot of writing was done trying to analyze this. One of those books I read (that my wife recommended) was The Little Book of Hygge by Meik Wiking.
Hygge is a danish/nordic concept that is most similar to the US equivalent of feeling cozy, though it is more than that. There are self-care elements that might be familiar to some Americans, but there is also strong emphasis on maintaining harmonious, egalitarian relationships. A wall decoration we bought near the Baltic Sea describes it as: Comfort, Togetherness, Harmony, Pleasure, Presence, Atmosphere.
Denmark, being located just north of Germany and surrounded by the North and Baltic seas, has long, harsh winters. The cultural emphasis on Hygge is a way to find joy and comfort in a dark, boring, and restrictive-feeling season. Wiking's analysis is that this focus on Hygge (when coupled with things like the mental wellbeing provided by their social safety net) put Denmark in the first spot in the list of happiest countries.
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In November, the days became aggressively shorter and darker. They started late and remained dim, gray, and rainy before ending early and abruptly. Almost every day that month was like this, and it was really difficult for me.
I did expect the difficulty, but I didn't expect to be affected by it that much. Later I realized this was an incredibly dense thing to think, as the previous 20 years of my life had been spent in the sunniest places in the US. So, of course it would be a painful adjustment to have overcast for more than 4 consecutive days.
It was around this time that my regular depression (coming and going a few days every couple of months), my newly acquired seasonal depression, and my COVID depression turned into a depression voltron and kicked my ass.
As a remote software developer in a big-enough living space, I realize that I've been experiencing social distancing on about the easiest difficulty level possible. Even still, it's frustrating to look back at this dark month of my life and realize how much differently things could have gone if we had been able to have friends over for game nights, met up in a brewery nearby, or travelled to visit those farther from us.
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Winter started (literally, on the solstice) with snow. It was beautiful. We sat with friends under our back patio, roasted marshmallows and baked stick bread over our little fire pit as thick snowflakes fell. Christmas music played faintly in the background and we drank mulled wine. It was Hygge and it was the happiest I had felt in a while.
Now, we're in the final weeks of Winter once again. The days are stretching out, the birds are singing again, the skies are more blue than gray, and there are more than a few reasons to be hopeful for the future.
Thanks for reading. Have a great weekend.